


In the End, What Is Real Mr. Wick?

by MistyBeethoven



Category: John Wick (Movies)
Genre: Assassins & Hitmen, Continental Hotel (John Wick), Coping, Death, Dreams vs. Reality, Existential Angst, Existential Crisis, Falling Apart, False Memories, Grief/Mourning, Healing, Hotels, Lost Love, Love, Love and Loss, Memories, Mind Manipulation, Mindfuck, Other, Phillip K Dickish, Punishment, Questioning, Reality, Robin Lord Taylor character, Science Fiction, Somewhat, Virtual Reality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-13
Updated: 2019-09-13
Packaged: 2020-10-14 18:35:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20605430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistyBeethoven/pseuds/MistyBeethoven
Summary: John Wick dies only to reawaken inside a High Table facility whereupon he learns that the last seven years of his life have been nothing more than an elaborate form of punishment.A confused Wick is left questioning reality as he finds himself grieving for a woman that never even existed.





	In the End, What Is Real Mr. Wick?

**Author's Note:**

> I recently watched "The Matrix" for the first time. I noticed how they kept on saying that the life inside the Matrix wasn't real and I started asking myself how unreal it really was? If everything surrounding the people trapped there was false, yet the feelings they had were real, was it completely fair to say it wasn't real?
> 
> It had to be to some extent. Compare that to the lead character from "A Clockwork Orange" where everything is real around him but his feelings are false and have been censored. 
> 
> Which is more real? If your world is fake but you are allowed to be yourself or if you are fake and everything else is real? 
> 
> So there I am watching John Wick 3, John is in the library, kissing Helen's photo and I start thinking about how we have only ever seen her in flashbacks. Then the idea for this story pops into my head and I just have to follow this odd thought that I have had.
> 
> Given JW's connection to the Matrix films it all seems fitting.
> 
> By no means is the "It's all a dream or simulation" a new concept. And this certainly has shades of "Inception." However I wanted to explore a few of my questions about reality and I hope it makes for an interesting read.
> 
> Enjoy. And have a happy Friday the 13th!

John Wick lay dying on a New York City street. He had managed to outrun the bounty on his head and the Excommunicado order for over two years but he could no more outrun a circle of the High Table's most valued servants surrounding him, as he stood unarmed in its center, than he could outrun the grief over the loss of his beloved wife. Grief and death came eventually to all men, even if the only mourning they would ever do was for themselves.

The group of assassins had fired in unison and no bulletproof suit or prayer could save John Wick. Nor would he want them to; he was tired of running and of a life without his love. Death had finally become something to be welcomed.

As he lay on the street counting his last few breaths, the last thought inside John's dying brain was the same as the final word on his tongue: "_Helen_."

Then all was darkness and the great Baba Yaga saw no more.

*

*

*

"Hello Mr. Wick."

John Wick opened his eyes expecting to see either God or the devil. Instead all he was greeted with was the sight of an Adjudicator standing placidly before him, as a Doctor busily took off the various wires and suction cups, which were attached several places on his upper torso and head.

"Where am I?" the assassin asked, understanding clearly that this was neither Heaven nor hell.

"You are in the safety of a High Table operated hospital," the Adjudicator stated. "You have no reason to fear. Your punishment has finally come to an end and you can go about your life as normal once again."

"My punishment?" John Wick asked in confusion as the Doctor removed the last wire, this one placed directly inside of his ear. It pinched as it was pulled out; a momentary pain which soon vanished.

"Yes: Your punishment."

John continued to stare at the High Table law official in obvious incomprehension. They gave the indication of wanting to sigh but, hopelessly professional, refrained from giving in to the urge.

"You do not remember now, Mr. Wick because the process has just been completed. If you were to remember your brain would not be able to handle it and you would _die_. In time your real memories will return. I am present to make sure that the process went through successfully and to explain to you what has just taken place. I will answer any questions that you may possibly have."

In the darkened room, where he sat shirtless on an examining table, Wick shuddered as he listened to the cart full of the electronic equipment, which he bad been hooked up to, rattled as the Doctor rolled it away.

"Shall we begin?"

The Baba Yaga considered the council's former words. "Why am I being punished?" he asked.

"You were being punished under the orders of one of the twelve whom sit at the table: a Gianna D'Antonio. You were involved with Ms. D'Antonio for several years until she discovered that you had a similar arrangement with a fellow assassin named Sofia. In retribution, she placed a very large bounty on your head."

"So why am I lying on this chair and not in the morgue?" Wick asked.

"The other eleven High Table members found it counter productive to let her order your death. You are, from what I have heard, an excellent killer, John Wick: the finest in your field," the Adjudicator complimented.

"So I am _still_ a servant for the High Table and I am _still_ a man named John Wick?"

The person nodded. "Or Jardani Jovanovich before your change of name. You will find all of your memories before the last seven years are mostly real, except for a few slight differences. The false ones begin shortly before you met Helen Wick."

Hearing the name, John's heart felt as if it were collapsing in on itself. His lungs felt constricted and breathing was as difficult as when he had erroneously believed himself to be dying on a New York City street.

"If I may continue," the Adjudicator suddenly spoke. "You were given a choice Mr. Wick, either of which would appease Ms. D'Antonio: death or to experience inside your mind an existence where you would suffer and lose everything that you loved. You opted for the latter and that is why you are here."

"Helen never existed," John Wick whispered but not low enough for the Adjudicator not to hear.

"She was the first thing you were set to lose. You see, Mr. Wick, having nothing you truly valued in the first place, we needed to present you with someone to love so that we could then take her away."

The words were spoken so callously, as if falling in love was a simple occurrence and killing that which was loved far easier. 

"We then gave you a puppy named Daisy to love and disposed of it as well. One by one your friends were killed or abandoned and betrayed you. You were severed from all ties to us and you lost everything until you wanted death. This experience, while not outright death, has been enough to please the party that you have offended. We now consider the matter closed."

"That's just it then?" John Wick asked in disbelief.

"We just request that you go to an Administrator as soon as possible and fill out the necessary paperwork before you get back to your real life and resume serving the Table, Mr. Wick."

It was John Wick's turn to nod for he knew not else what to do.

"Good day, Mr. Wick," the Adjudicator said before they turned around, leaving John Wick alone with his grief for a woman whom had never even existed.

* * *

The Administrator stood behind his desk looking tough yet frazzled as he rifled through the papers before him. John Wick watched him, finding the distraction from his own muddled thoughts somewhat comforting. The bureaucrat was a small man with long black hair gathered together at the top of the back of his head. His face was a collection of piercings and on his nose sat a pair of glasses. The Administrator wore a pink dress shirt, his sleeves rolled up to display the tattoos which obviously lay hidden beneath his clothing. Over the shirt he wore a black tie with a gem in its center with a grey vest.

John Wick could not remember having met this man before but the man seemed to know him. This belief was proven when the bureaucrat sighed heavily in search of the papers and then exclaimed, "You were in here no more than three hours ago and I've lost the stupid things!"

"I was just in here?" Wick asked. Questions were quickly becoming the primary content of his communication.

The Administrator stopped what he was doing and looked at the assassin over his glasses.

"You mean you don't remember?"

John shook his head and watched as the bureaucrat removed his glasses and wearily rubbed the bridge of his nose where they had previously been sitting.

"Do you know how long it took for you to receive your punishment?"

"No," the Baba Yaga answered. 

"It took roughly 2 hours for them to place what was roughly the equivalent of seven years of experiences, from what they tell me, inside your brain. It would have been instantaneous but you specifically requested that your decisions remain your own throughout the data processing."

There was silence as John processed this data as well.

"And tell me, after it all, Mr Wick: Looking at me now, who is it that feels more real to you? Helen, your imaginary wife, or myself?" the Administrator queried.

"My wife," John Wick answered without hesitation.

"Yet you actually met me," the High Table pencil pusher sighed as he returned the glasses back to the perch which was his nose. "Tell me yet another thing: do you still love her?"

The assassin feared speaking lest his answer made him appear silly.

The Administrator appeared visibly upset as he forsook the search for John Wick's file completely. "I told them that the punishment was too cruel; that it did not fit the crime. They should never have offered it to you but they desired your continued service so..."

John Wick looked to the ground, and his perfectly polished black shoes, as he listened to the office boss continue to vent about something he still couldn't even remember.

"They messed around with your brain and for what? Gianna was fooling around behind your back with Cassian. Everybody knew it, including you, John Wick. You were not guilty of anything she was not but because she sits at the table and you are a lowly assassin you were the one to pay."

"You seem upset," Wick said both embarrassed and oddly grateful.

"Of course," the Administrator sighed. "They had no right. I said as much to them; told them they should do the same thing to Ms. D'Antonio but they accused me of being a misogynist. I corrected them: I'm a misanthropist and this type of fucking behaviour is _why_." 

"It's all right," John Wick stated feeling the sudden urge to comfort the irate little High Table servant.

The pierced man laughed bitterly before searching his desk for the lost file again. "Tell me that in a few months when the real mindfuck starts happening...when you have started losing your mind. I've seen it before."

Finding what he was looking for, the Administrator handed the assassin some loose sheets of paper.

"Fill these out. Then give them back," the bureaucrat instructed as he held out the papers and John Wick took them warily.

The Administrator continued to stare at Wick with anger in his cold green eyes. Anger and sympathy.

"I pray that you find a way to navigate where the others failed, Mr. Wick. If you don't, I suppose Gianna D'Antonio will have succeeded after all. Goodbye, Mr. Wick."

John stood silent and thoughtful as an Operator appeared to show him where he could fill out the paperwork. It was simple stuff, merely a few questions like his name and a few places to sign that same name. When he had finished, he half expected to see the Administrator again, but was only shown to another office worker. She took the forms and hurried him out back to his home.

John Wick stumbled down the stairs of the Administration building under a midnight blue and clouded sky, wondering just exactly where his home was.

* * *

While walking to the New York Continental's registration desk, Wick kept looking for his dog but then would stop himself upon realizing that there was no dog and never had been. The canine he had rescued at the shelter, before it had been put down, could not keep him company during his stay at the hotel for he was only some false creation in his mind.

As Wick watched Charon, the attractive bald North African concierge, smile at him, he remembered how the man had kindly cared for the dog, only to have to stop himself again.

"Have you seen my dog?" John Wick asked the hotel worker, wanting to see for sure.

"You have a dog, Mr. Wick?" the concierge smiled. 

"No. I guess, I don't."

"Just as well," Charon said kindly. "They are not looked at kindly on Continental grounds. They tend to stain the carpets and shed. Would you like your key back?"

The assassin nodded slowly.

Sensing the hotel guest's suspicion, the concierge smiled kindly. "You left it with us in case the punishment had unforseen and undesired results. I am glad that it did not. Do not worry about your memory: it will return soon."

John Wick nodded again, this time more freely.

Charon beamed politely once more and handed the hitman the key. John Wick took it and in great haste made his way to the hotel room that had supposedly been his for an assumedly long duration.

Upon entering the room, Wick noted that it _did_ look familiar but more like a painting you had seen a few times and forgotten. The room felt far less solid than the beautiful and magnificent white house where he had lived with Helen. While most rooms found inside hotels always possessed that cold feeling of just passing through, this one faced it even more when being in the shadow of a memory of an unbuilt structure. There was no warmth here for Helen Wick had never been inside this suite; it had never witnessed her smile or had the sound of her laughter echo off of its perfectly painted and decorated walls.

Staring at the exquisite Rembrandt print above the bed, John Wick smiled as he remembered Helen's happiness over buying him one of those awful dogs playing poker paintings to decorate his den. It had been perfectly atrocious, and wonderfully just right, and he had loved her even more for trying to make him laugh by giving it to him as a present.

Only she never had.

John stared at the Rembrandt for a few seconds before heading to the suite's bathroom. Once inside he quickly splashed some water on his face, dried it off and then studied his reflection for much longer. He half suspected to see some other face staring back at him; suspected the Adjudicator to have been lying when they claimed that everything was the same except for those painful seven years. But it bore the same exact features as he had seen in any mirror during his years with Helen and his years running from the High Table. There was the patchy beard and the dark longish hair. There too was the mole by his neck, John easily found as he pushed his collar away.

Meeting his own eyes in the mirror, John saw the same sorrow also. Pain was etched there as deeply as it had been following Helen's death and he wondered if it had existed before the High Table's unusual punishment.

Had a fake woman's passing managed to make a real living man's eyes horribly haunted? If she had what would it take to convince himself that she had never existed in the first place, the assassin wondered?

Or would that simply feel like losing her all over again?

John Wick looked at his face in the reflection and realized that it was wet once more.

* * *

Waking up in the Continental the next afternoon was disorienting for the non-Excommunicado servant for the High Table. Throughout the night, memories had flooded back to him. Yet for their return they still felt unreal and foggy as if they were seen through frosted glass. John Wick often thought of any event of the seven years which had been placed inside of his head and they seemed far more clear and tangible. 

Still, it was nice to walk down to the Continental bar, and finding Winston sitting at a table, to be able to join him, knowing that the man had never betrayed him.

"Jonathan," the hotel manager smiled warmly as the assassin joined him.

"Thank you for not trying to kill me by shooting me off of your hotel's roof," John said, pushing his chair closer.

"Part of the punishment, I assume?"

"Yes," Wick nodded.

"How was it? I have heard it can be hell," Winston said, taking a sip from his martini.

John opened his mouth to say yes but found himself halting from speaking as he remembered Helen's sweet smile and kind eyes. "It was interesting," was all he chose to say.

"How long did it last for inside of your mind?" the Englishman placed the glass back down on the table.

"About seven years."

"Consider that seven years over the rest of us, my son," Winston patted his friend's hand. "Time flies when you're alive."

"That's what Helen always said," John Wick smiled, thinking about his wife.

"Who?" Winston asked and the assassin felt a crack begin in his heart.

* * *

The crack widened as time progressed, as did the feeling that nothing was true around him. He doubted his own existence. The only thing which felt real was the constant heavy sorrow weighing down the beating of his heart.

It did not take the assassin long to realize that he was still mourning for Helen Wick. It did not matter she only existed in his head; they had never given him time in his punishment fantasy to get over his grief so it stayed with him. It was odd grieving for a pretend memory.

Stranger still to discover that you were afraid you were still in love with that memory, John realized in fright.

The most horrible thing about it all had hit him as he was talking with Winston in the Continental Bar. He wasn't just the only person who remembered Helen: he was the only person that _knew_ of the woman at all.

When you had grief left to you as some agonized legacy, you were, at least, granted the comfort of having people be aware and understanding of your loss. Memories could be shared so you could momentarily resurrect the dead or you could find some solace in the empathy of another human soul; a soul that had probably suffered a similar loss at some point in their lives.

When you loved and lamented a figment of the imagination, kindness was not so easily offered.

This was shown to him several days later when he encountered his old mentor and friend, Marcus while out at a health food store.

At first, Wick had thought he had seen a ghost before he reminded himself that Marcus had not been killed by Viggo Tarasov and it had all been in his head.

"John," the older assassin had greeted in good cheer. "How have you been after the punishment?"

John had long been hiding his true answer when poised with this particular question. He feared the strange looks of people whom would not understand the difficulty he was having adapting to reality. To them, he had just experienced a two hour prison sentence; to John Wick it had been seven years of phantom degradation, fear and agony.

However, Marcus had always been one of the most philosophical and thoughtful men that he had ever known.

"I haven't been well Marcus," John answered.

The older man frowned. "I'm sorry to hear that John."

"Can we go some place and talk?"

They went to the restaurant section of the health food store and Marcus listened carefully to John Wick's story of what had happened during the High Table's extravagant punishment. The other assassin seemed to be thinking strongly about what Wick was telling him. The Baba Yaga could tell that his friend was stricken by the revelation that he had died in this simulated version of unreal events. Marcus believed only in this world; his own mortality was a constant concern hence his worship of keeping his body in perfect condition. Knowing that he had perished in a simulation was no less disturbing to the man.

"I keep thinking of her Marcus. Every time I go to sleep...every time I wake up. I see her face in here," John pointed to his forehead, indicating the brain underneath, "Even though I never even really saw it."

"Do you wish it had been real?"

John thought about it and longed to say that he didn't but knew it would be as much a lie as the memories tormenting him.

Sensing his friend's answer, Marcus seemed visibly offended. "But I'm not dead, here, at least, John! You actually _know_ me. I thought you may be grateful."

"I am Marcus but I..."

"You're still mourning a woman that never existed?"

"Yes," the younger assassin whispered.

"But she wasn't real John," Marcus said and placed a comforting hand on Wick's shoulder. "She was something designed to torment you. Don't stay in that punishment. Let her go and move on. This...this isn't healthy."

The Baba Yaga inhaled deeply as if air were a more welcome cure than his friend's suggestion.

* * *

In his hotel room, lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling and missing things that had never been at all, John Wick heard a light knocking at the door. He arose from his queen size bed and went to answer it, no longer having to dread the attempts on his life from a thousand greedy peers.

Standing outside of the door, looking drop dead gorgeous in a skin tight and frilly maroon dress was Sofia.

"I thought I'd give you a few days after your punishment but its been too long now," she said pushing her way in to the room. "Your time is up, John Wick."

When Sofia pressed her eager lips into his, the bearded assassin let her; his days were so empty now and he was curious to see what it felt like.

The answer was nothing.

Sensing her lover's reaction was less than she had desired, the female assassin backed away. "What did they _do_ to you, John. This isn't what it was like before."

Regaining his past memories, the man knew that she was right; it was not like it had been before. By now they would be on the bed fucking each other senseless. But now John Wick was also fully aware that it had never been completely what Sofia had believed it to be either. Her lover had never truly been in love with her. In fact, John Wick now knew that before his punishment he had never been in love at all. What he had started with the beautiful woman before him had been nothing more than an escape from the tedious relationship he had fallen into with Gianna. No doubt if he had fallen into a full fledged union with Sofia, he would have gradually strayed from her as well. Although his body had been fully into any relationship he had been in, John knew that his heart had never truly followed.

Not until he had fallen in love inside a make believe world devised as his punishment, that was.

In desperation, Sofia threw her former lover on the bed and began to kiss him in some futile attempt to reignite the spark between them. When she saw that his body did not respond as it had before, she offered him a look of hatred and pain before rushing out the door and slamming it behind her, leaving Wick feeling like a jerk but grateful she was gone all the same.

* * *

That night, lying awake in bed, John Wick thought about his first time with Helen. He remembered her sweetness and gentleness. In the dark, he could still recall the scent of her, the softness of her skin and the sounds of her moans.

He wondered who had created them. What god had made his non-existant love?

He pondered searching for them, or even for the model herself, but then thought against it. Her designer was a poor man's deity. They could not make her real. And the woman that shared her face would not share their memories. It was doubtful that her name was even Helen.

No, John Wick thought bitterly. It was of no use. He could not find his love. She had died when he had been set free from his punishment. Even died was not the right term, he also realized; to die something must be born: Helen Wick had not even been that.

When he died there would be no reunion.

He feared that God would only echo Winston's oblivious "Who?"

* * *

Days passed. John Wick found himself existing to kill; it was the one thing that he was still good at. His appearance went to hell in his neglect. One did not need to look attractive to murder.

Passing Iosef Tarasov on the street a few times, John had to put his Block 34 away and remind himself that the young man was not a puppy killer, at least as far as he knew, and Daisy no longer needed to be avenged.

He saw Gianna and Cassian once in the Continental's bar. They were kissing in a corner booth and when they separated and saw him they both began to laugh. It seemed that the Camorra princess had gotten her wish after all: the destruction of John Wick.

At one point, he visited the New York Public Library to search for a book of Russian Fairy Tales to find a photo of a beautiful woman smiling with her husband, whom had once been very happy.

But the book, the photo and the couple were all fairy tales themselves.

Dreams were his only relief for sometimes he was lucky enough to dream of Helen. Yet, he would always awaken to the knowledge that she was gone and the dreams of her were sadly equal to the reality of her: nothing more than imagination.

Seeking vindication, John Wick visited the Adjudicator, whom had witnessed his punishment. He had done so on a whim, deciding to ask them how they could allow this to have been done to him.

"You allowed it to be done to yourself, Mr. Wick," they had retaliated without sympathy. "You offended a High Table member and then you chose that _particular_ form of punishment. If I recall correctly, at your trial, you said that it was preferable to death. You said that if it was only a fantasy it did not matter if you lost everything. Only reality mattered to you, John Wick, and your _real_ life."

John Wick scowled at the memory of those words even if he could not completely remember everything clearly. He hated the arrogant fool who had said them and showed him as much sympathy as he was being shown now.

"And how is your life?" the Adjudicator asked.

"In shambles," John sneered. "I feel as if I am going crazy."

"I'm sorry to hear that," the law official stated. "Have a nice day."

* * *

In an open field, the dreaded Baba Yaga looked for a house which had never been built. He owed no marker to Santino D'Antonio or had not even completed an impossible task for Viggo Tarasov to aid in its construction. Instead the land was empty except for some daisies which grew there as if purely to mock him.

John Wick walked away from the vacant space, his hands in his empty pockets. He returned to a sad and lonely Mercedes, wishing that it was a "69 Ford Mustang Mach 1. Not because it was a better vehicle but only because then Helen Wick would be real enough to have given it to him.

As he sat in the driver's seat, trying to collect his wasted and messed up thoughts, the assassin looked at the ten fingers on the steering wheel and, likewise, wished that there were only nine.

* * *

He was sitting at the bar at the Continental, polishing off what must have been his seventh whiskey, when he noticed the man on the other end, staring at him intensely. The man looked familiar and if he hadn't had so many drinks he may have instantly recognized him. Now with his brain in a fog, all he could see were the piercings and tattoos; those and the black mark under the man's left eye.

"What are you looking at?" Wick managed to hiss without slurring and was quite pleased with himself.

"So you did not navigate like I had hoped," the familiar looking man stated setting his glass down on the counter. "I am sorry."

Not wanting the man's pity, John Wick walked over to him, prepared to strike him. The first swing, however, did not reach his target's pierced face, and before he knew it, Wick felt a shock of pain as the smaller man punched him.

Then all was darkness and the great Baba Yaga knew no more.

* * *

When John Wick awoke it was with the hope that he would find himself dying on a New York City street and that the past few months had been the real lie. He was immensely disappointed to find himself fully clothed on his bed at the Continental.

He looked at the foot of the bed, and in his newfound sobriety, finally recognized the man as the Administrator he had met many months ago in his dark and smoky office.

"Hello Mr. Wick," the bureaucrat flatly greeted.

"Did you just punch me at the bar?" John Wick asked.

The Administrator nodded.

"In front of everybody?"

Another nod.

Wick frowned in embarrassment. No matter what his personal reputation was, he had always, at least, prided himself on an impeccable professional one. However if anybody had seen him being taken down by the little office punk that was probably shot to hell now also.

"Nobody saw us," the Administrator consoled the hitman, having read his thoughts. "Addy had left her post and everybody else was watching the performer on the stage or looking to get laid. When Winston saw me carrying you up here, I told him that you were drunk and had passed out. He bought it. Tell me, Mr. Wick, is that a fairly common sight these days?"

Wick did not say a word but continued to stare at the High Table civil servant.

The Administrator sighed. "I had hoped that you would have the strength to find your way. I am disappointed to find you so lost."

The pity in the bureaucrat's clear eyes behind his specktacles stirred in John Wick a sudden fierce ire once again. He hated himself so deeply, John did not desire it. He remembered this man's anger over his punishment and smirked.

"From what I hear," Wick spat in rancour, "I did this to myself. I was the fucking fool who thought it would not hurt me."

The Administrator continued to stare at him. "You remember your words at the trial?"

"Vaguely," John Wick answered truthfully. "Everything is kind of blurred from around the time my punishment was delivered."

"Do you remember our conversation?" the pierced man asked.

The assassin shook his head. He could not remember a single word.

"You told me a different tale. You were quite candid, Mr. Wick. Fear will do that. They were going to kill you if you didn't accept the alternate form of punishment. You knew this. You stood before me in your three piece, six figured suit and you confessed to me that it was not really death that frightened you. It was something else entirely. You were terrified for only one reason: You told me that you did not want to die never having been in love. You were willing to go through with the punishment if it allowed you one final chance to love and be loved. They promised you, after all, in the world they had made for you, someone to love and a brief period of happiness.."

"And you believed me?" John Wick asked.

"Yes," the Administrator replied.

"Why? And why would I even tell you all of this?

"The answers are the same: your fear was my own. Being the skilled assassin you could sense my own weakness. We are not so different, Mr. Wick."

"You've never been in love?"

The bureaucrat refused to remark on what he had already implied. Instead he focused on the assassin's own singular dilemma.

"You survived inside of your punishment for seven years. What kept you living?"

"Helen," John Wick replied. "And when she was gone the memory of her."

"And now you are given the chance to remember her freely. Yet you dishonor her with ingratitude?"

"You want me to live a lie?" the bearded hitman said in awe.

"Why not?" the Administrator shrugged. "I ask you: would it be really be a lie at all?"

"What do you mean?" John asked in unwanted confusion.

"As I mentioned before, inside of your punishment you specifically requested that your choices be your own. That means that every single thing that you did was up to you. Even the person you fell in love with. The only requirement to be filled was that you would love, lose everything and then die. But it was always you inside of that situation, John Wick. Every single choice and every single fucking emotion and agony was yours. That is why they linger with you still.

"So how false was it? If you remained yourself inside of a fantasy...if your feelings were real what makes it a fantasy? Would it be wrong to accept it as your own private reality? Do I or anybody else have the right to tell you any differently?"

John considered his words and felt the sides of the crack inside of his heart come closer together. They were still there but the distance between them not so wide nor the precipice as deep.

"I picked a daisy once," the Administrator started and John Wick shivered at his words. "It was in an abandoned lot in the heart of this city. I examined and felt its petals and it brought me joy. I still think of it and remembering feel some kind of happiness. Nobody saw me do it and the flower soon withered and died, no doubt, after I had so thoughtlessly shortened its life. I have no proof that it even happened besides the memory that I have. Does that make it any less real?"

"No," the assassin said for he knew that it did not.

"What is reality, Mr. Wick? Were your feelings for her any less real because she did not exist? Is my dreadful existence living day by day in that fucking office any less than a joke than what the High Table put you through? At least you were allowed to love. For all of us whom have never had that pleasure I suggest you live in the memory of that love and tell the rest of _reality_ to fuck off."

"Who can I talk to about her?" John asked as he felt the sting of tears.

"Talk to yourself, the air or to God. You will find that people rarely listen or understand lest it concerns themselves, anyway," the pierced man shrugged. "You're better on your own. Or you can always talk to me. At least, I won't think that you're strange and I have nothing which vaguely resembles a life to assume to discredit yours. Now I must return to my office. You can reach me there if you need me."

"You make a lousy misanthropist," John Wick smiled at the man as he walked towards the door.

The Administrator did not comment but only offered him a businesslike nod. "Goodbye, Mr. Wick."

The bureaucrat closed the door softly behind him.

In his empty hotel room, Wick thought of the Administrator's words. He remembered Helen and her sweet and bright smile. Feeling the love that filled his heart, John Wick examined it.

The assassin began to contemplate the image of a heart itself. Two existed: the real one inside of his chest, furiously working to keep him alive and the figurative one, where all of his love resided and was kept safe. It made sense that Helen Wick should remain inside the one that could not be seen. Just as she no longer could except when he shut his eyes.

While the real heart was the one you could see, it was the imagined one that really mattered. Without it, the physical organ, who's purpose was to pump blood, was worthless since life was not worth living anymore and no longer had any purpose.

So had been his thinking, John Wick finally remembered, when he had willingly decided on his form of punishment.

Focusing on the only smile which had ever meant anything to him, the assassin mirrored it and soon after fell asleep; peacefully knowing, that if death came to him now, he had, at least, used his false heart once.


End file.
